"Okay, at the stroke of seven, we'll begin. That's in five minutes. Ready?"

"This is so dumb. I can't believe we agreed to play this game," said Ron, crouching down in the twilight.

"It's only a couple hours," said Harry. "Besides, we owe Hermione for saving our butts on our Potions final."

"Oh yeah," said Ron quietly. "I just wish we didn't have to play outside. The grass is wet."

"You two! Stop talking and listen to me!" A half-grown girl stood before them. "Okay, you-" she pointed to Harry, "-are going to play this guy here." She stuffed a figurine in his hand. He looked at it. It was a thickly muscled black man, with his left arm torn off, and a plastic rifle tied on in its place.

"Er," he said. "Ginger, who is this?"

"That's Barrett, can't you tell? See his gun arm? He shoots people with it."

"That's- great," said Harry. Ron was trying to supress a laugh. Ginger looked at Ron. "And you get to play Sephiroth, since my brother doesn't want to play with us today." She placed a barbie doll in his hands. He took it gingerly. "What's a Sephiroth?"

She sighed. "He's the BAD guy. Don't you know anything? Oh, here's his sword." She placed a green cocktail sword in his hands. "It's a little bent, but you can pretend it's not." She turned to her friend.

Ron and Harry looked at each other. "Hermione!" called Ron. Harry turned. Hermione walked into the yard with a cloth bag at her side. "I'm back," she said. "You wouldn't believe the line at the store!"

"I do hope you'll join us," said Ron, holding up his Barbie gleefully.

Hermione looked at the doll in horror. Its once beautiful dress had been colored entirely black with a marker, and its dog-chewed face had been redrawn with nail polish. "What is that?"

"I'm the BAD guy," said Ron.

"Hermione!" cried Ginger, turning around. "Are you going to play Final Fantasy Seven with us? Please? You have to!"

"Well, um, I was just going inside..."

"Come on Hermione, it won't be any fun without you!" Ron called.

"And if you play," said Harry, "I'll let you borrow my gun-arm man!" He held up Barrett.

Hermione laughed. "Your what?"

"That's Barrett," Ginger said, taking him from Harry. "You can't play with him though. You have to play as Aeris." She held out a large doll with light brown hair.

"Who's that?" Hermione asked, taking the doll.

"She's Cloud's girlfriend. Well, his other girlfriend. I get to be Tifa." She held up a dark-haired Barbie in a skimpy outfit.

"He has two girlfriends?"

"Yeah, but one dies halfway through the game."

"Oh, that's... sad."

"Yeah, everyone remember to cry when she dies."

"Okay, we will," said Hermione, turning to Ron and Harry.

"Not you, you can't cry," said the girl. "You'll be dead."

"Oh."

Harry and Ron snickered from behind.

"And Susie gets to play as Cloud, because my brother isn't playing."

Susie interrupted: "But I wanted to play as the cat..."

"Susie, you have to play as Cloud. He's the hero, and all the other roles are taken!"

"But I want to play as the cat..."

"Okay," said the girl. "You can play as Cloudcat Sith." She whispered something into her friend's ear. She looked at them. "Okay, she's Cloud, but she's running around inside Cat Sith."

Ron nudged Hermione: "Does any of this make any sense to you?" he whispered.

She shook her head. "Just play along. We've only got a few more hours of this."

"Muggles are so weird," muttered Ron.

"Okay, everybody take their positions!" The girl and her friend ran off into a corner of the yard and hid behind a tree, leaving Hermione, Ron and Harry in the middle of the yard.

"Remind me again, Hermione, why we have to do this?"

"Because you owe me big-time."

"I know. But really, do you think we have to stoop to this?"

"You remember that water balloon incident the week before last?"

"That was Seamus..."

"You told him to do it. So this is all your own fault."

Ron raised the arm on his Barbie doll.

"Come on, Ron," said Harry. "Didn't you ever play toys like this as a kid?"

"Yeah, but we played with cool toys. Look at this thing. In what universe is this remotely scary? It doesn't even move on its own!"

"It is- was- a Barbie, Ron. All muggles have them. Only this one's been-"

"-butchered?"

"Something like that."

"So do you have any?"

"Um," said Harry, looking up, "what are they doing?" Hermione turned. Ginger was halfway up the tree in the corner of the yard, and squealing in a high voice. "Help!"

They ran over. "Ginger! What is it?" called Hermione.

She screamed. "I'm being chased by a monster! Help!" She inched out farther along the branch.

"I'll save you!" said Harry, holding up his action figure.

"No, you can't!" said Ginger. "That's Cloud's job."

"Oh," said Harry. "So then what's my job?"

"Your job is to fight monsters until later."

"Watch out Harry! The BAD guy's coming to get you!" A barbie came flying down from the sky.

"Oh no you don't!" cried Harry, raising Barret's arm. "I'm going to shoot you dead with my automatic rifle arm!"

"Ginger," said Hermione. "You really shouldn't be in that tree." Ginger wasn't listening. She was already busy climbing down. "Susan," she was saying. "You need to come save me!"

"But you're too high up!"

"You have to. You're the hero! Oh well, go fight Sephiroth first. Those two are playing it all wrong."

Harry and Ron were paying no attention.

"Come back here and fight me like a man!" called Harry, Barret standing on a rock in the middle of the yard. Ron had his barbie on the picnic table.

"I can't fight you; I'm not a man!" said Ron in a high-pitched voice. "But I can curse you! I curse you with my green sword-wand... Cruciatus!"

"Ron!" hissed Hermione. "Don't even joke about that! And don't talk about it here..."

Ron rolled his eyes. "Very well then, I'll throw my sword-wand at you!"

"Hah! Your puny sword is no match for my gun arm! I can hit you from back here!" He waved the figure's arm up and down.

Susan ran over. "Wait! I'm here to fight the bad guy too! Die Sephiroth!" She ran towards Ron and stopped. "Where's your sword?"

"Oh, I lost it," said Ron.

"I can't fight you without your sword. We're supposed to swordfight."

Harry laughed and came over. Susan was already looking in the grass. "I don't see it," she said.

"What's going on?" called Ginger from the tree.

"Sephiroth lost his sword," said Susan.